


Fey Moon

by Russet022 (TheRavenintheMoon)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Real world, first person monologue, if the wizarding world actually existed as a sub-culture to this world, implied thought of suicide, utter absurdity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-20 01:40:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/579895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheRavenintheMoon/pseuds/Russet022
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A woman meets a man, and finds herself inexplicably drawn to help him. A study in how to write a first person narrative.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fey Moon

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Or any of the books I briefly mention.  
> Personal prompt: If the wizarding world actually existed as a sub-culture to this world, it's inevitable that someone, eventually, would at some point come in contact with wizards, whether they were initially aware of it or not. Rowling's books, in that case, would be a genius play to turn the wizarding world into simply a "children's" story, so that muggles would be more inclined to remain blissfully ignorant. What would happen, if someone, in the confines of that world, was faced with a wizard? Yeah, I didn't actually answer the question, but I liked the story I ended up with, so I hope you enjoy!

Fey Moon 

They say that it is unlucky to be born under a waxing moon. Strange things tend to happen to those poor souls who, through no fault of their own, are first seen by the eyes of a nearly full, or worse, a true full moon. Under the light of a waxing moon, it is said that the child’s first cry calls the fey, the little people, the fair folk. It is then that the fairies make their mischief, sometimes blessing a baby; more often than not they burden a baby with prophecies, curses, or both. It is said that these fey-touched babies become children of the Moon. Some are fairly normal, astronomers, perhaps. Others are changelings in any sense of the term. Many grow up to have magic.

I, however, was born under a waning moon, two days before it was new, to be exact. I’m no one special, as ordinary as a person comes. Well, not _so_ ordinary anymore, as it happens. I am an author, and I write fantasy. It sells, too, which is not quite normal. I grew up on Tolkien’s _Lord of the Rings_ , after all, and when David Edding’s Garion came along, he was inspiring, too. I discovered Rowling years later, quite by accident, and promptly fell in love.

Well, maybe “promptly” isn’t the right word. I was thirty-seven years old, after all, and already published myself. I kept up with new stories in the genre just to be sure I wasn’t, oh, stealing ideas, or something. That’s what I told everyone, anyway. My family thought I should read more sophisticated material. I have nothing against sophisticated, but I like a healthy dose of adventures, swordfights, and magic spells with my political, er, _social_ intrigue. There’s very little magic in “quality” literature.

But I digress. The point I was trying to make was that I was a thirty-seven year old, single author who was looking for a good story to read in the spare time my lack of a social life brought. I was wandering the bookstore at a complete loss, and just as I passed the children’s section, a random title leapt out at me.

Okay, so it wasn’t entirely random. I’d recently done a lot of research on the old practice of alchemy, and there it was: _Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone_. Someone else had beaten me to the resurrection of alchemy in literature. I was crushed. So, naturally, I picked it up to read the summary, and found myself intrigued, as well as pleased with the distinct lack of literary alchemical renewal. I bought the book, waited a year, and bought the second. By the time the fourth book came out, Harry was gathering a following. They were mostly kids, so I passed my obsession off as professional interest. Barely.

For three years I stewed, waiting, rather impatiently, I might add, for the monstrous fifth book to come out. In that time I finished writing a novella about a rebellion of the Moon’s children against those of the Sun. I have a thing about the moon, if you hadn’t noticed. Perhaps it’s because I was born without Luna’s eyes on me.

Anyway, I did a lot of rereading during those years as well. It was a kind of a dry spell for fantasy. At any rate, _Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban_ was one of the books I kept going back to. Short of writing style, it had everything I looked for in a novel for entertainment. It had mystery, the threat of new villains, the beginnings of politics, and a whole cast of wonderful returning characters augmented by new characters and abstract concepts. No mere brawn would have sufficed against history, the whole back-story that came with an escaped convict and a certain new professor. Did I mention I have a thing for literary werewolves, as well? Charles de Lint’s Kern in _Wolf Moon_ , for example. I did say I was a little moon crazy, not to mention the wonders one can work with a werewolf, a girl, and _Beauty and the Beast_.

That was when I fell in love, with a fictional werewolf, no less. It was a dry spell for me personally, as well, so it wasn’t like I had anything better to fantasize about. There are worse obsessions to be sure.

So, after the open declaration of war in the wizarding world, the plain, old, normal world waited two years for _Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince_. It was 2005, seven years after the series would have ended had it actually happened. July 21, the day fandom was waiting for, was just under a month away.

I remember that June particularly in terms of Rowling’s work because the full moon fell on my forty-fifth birthday. My friends spent months teasing me about it, what with my obsession with fictional werewolves, and all. It was a few days after, I think, when everything changed, purely by chance.

I was walking in a park not far from my flat. It was late afternoon, and it was hot as Hades, but the breeze off the deep, stone-rimmed pond was cool. I remembered the letter someone had sent to the paper when the pond was put in, asking that it not be built because it was going to be a suicide trap. I had no real opinion on the matter since I had never heard of anyone who had actually filled their pockets with rocks from the liberally-strewn bank and gone for a swim through to eternity.

Anyway, I was walking around the far side of the pond, contemplating the trees and wondering if it was worth it to research dryads at all, when I noticed a man gazing blankly across the water from the opposite bank. He was poorly dressed in a faded blue button-down shirt and worn, wrinkled trousers that might have been black at one point in time. Maybe it was his clothes, or his grey-streaked brown hair, or the deep creases in a face no older than mine, but he seemed detached, a part of some world only he could see. 

I passed through his line of vision, but he didn’t react at all. He didn’t shift a muscle; he didn’t even blink. It was like I wasn’t there. As I came around the curve of the pond, I got a good look at his eyes. They were a curious sort of dark brown that shone with gold flecks in their depths, like dull amber. They were dead eyes, not a spark of emotion behind them. I was strongly reminded of a ghost, he was so faded and pale.

He stooped, suddenly yet slowly, to pick up one of the round-ish, flattened rocks that littered the edge of the pond, then stood, contemplating the dirt clinging to the hardened wrinkles time had wrought on its face. It struck me that he had a weathered face of stone, and I had a crazy urge to make him laugh. I wanted desperately to know what color his eyes would be when they sparkled with life.

The faded man was a complete stranger to me. I couldn’t have known that he had been born under a waxing moon, three days before it was full, to be precise, and he was all the old myths personified. If one chose to believe, as those of his world must, he _had_ been cursed by the fey. He _was_ one of the Moon’s children, and he _was_ a changeling. He’d also been the catalyst for the beginning of the end of the most feared Dark Wizard of our time. He’d lost his entire family, and he no longer had a specific duty to fill. He was ready to let go of his curse and go home. Not that he had told his friends this. He had rationalized their love away, and had nothing left.

I didn’t know this. As I said, I couldn’t have. I do not belong to his world, and so did not know his name and face from school or from newspaper articles dating back for over twenty years. But there was something about him I connected with.

I’m not an outgoing person, but there was no one else around, and I knew I had to do something. Maybe it was fate, or the Moon, or maybe it was just me being a melodramatic, romantic sap. I doubt I’ll ever know.

Whatever it was, I reached his side. He didn’t notice me until I bent down and retrieved a round-ish, flattened, dirty stone for myself. I examined it, glancing side-long at him to see if I had his attention. He seemed mildly surprised by my presence. I quirked an eyebrow at him, then crouched down and flicked my wrist in what had once been a practiced gesture. The stone plonked into the water with a loud, unsatisfactory splash. I frowned and stood up again. He was looking at me like I was crazy. Maybe I was. I’m not sure what possessed me to say what I did.

“It’s bee a long time since I tried skipping stones, but these particular stones are just begging to be skipped, don’t you think?”

He looked at the rock in his hand with a rather dumbfounded expression that was strange on his melancholy face. “I suppose so,” he said after a moment’s thought then mutely offered the stone to me.

“Why don’t you try?” I asked with a smile. He stared at me for a long time. I raised an eyebrow, and he sighed.

“It’s been so long…” His voice was a whisper that held an echo of regret, but he crouched, flicked his wrist much more smoothly than I had, and was rewarded when the stone skipped once before vanishing in a wash of ripples. 

I crouched beside him before he had a chance to stand, and picked up another stone. It gave another unsatisfactory plonk. I frowned again, and he offered me a faint half-smile at my expense. It didn’t quite reach his eyes, and it solidified my resolve to see him laugh.

I shrugged, but didn’t say anything. I picked up a third rock, and he sighed again. He had apparently decided to humor my insane need to revert to my childhood. No doubt he wanted to be well shot of me, but he caught my attention and flicked another stone. Two hops. I managed one inelegant jump. 

We sat companionably for what seemed like a short time as the sun began its westward descent, not speaking, skipping stones with quick flicks of our wrists and slowly gaining back the old childhood skill. Neither of us made a sound beyond a soft exclamation when first he, and then I, made three skips.

Then he did the impossible. He skipped a stone at the same time a duck, oblivious, glided around a curve and out from behind some overhanging branches. Maybe it was an especially stupid duck. At any rate, his stone jumped three times, and very nearly landed squarely on the duck's slick back before sliding into the water with a plop. The duck gave a loud squawk and flew off again, quacking its indignation to the blue sky. We looked at it, then at each other.

“Is that three and a half?” I asked, a tremor of surprise and amusement in my voice. He shrugged, then met my eyes, and we began to laugh at the utter absurdity of the moment. It was nice, sitting on the edge of the pond in the park on a hot day in late June, laughing with a melancholy stranger. The laughter lit his eyes with life. They were pure amber in color, and I thought they were rather beautiful.


End file.
